L.A. Weekly's Top 10 Films of 2011

Margaret, written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan (You Can Count on Me),
starring Anna Paquin with key supporting performances from Matt Damon
and Mark Ruffalo, is the best film of 2011. Chances are very, very good
that you haven't seen it -- or weren't even aware that it was something
you could see. And right now, it isn't -- at least, not in LA.

1/10

MELANCHOLIA,Lars von Trier (Denmark)

The sheer beauty and personal depth of Lars von Trier's triangle of
depression, anxiety and cosmic apocalypse have been well documented.
What has been overlooked, I think -- and what pushes Melancholia
into masterpiece realm, for me -- is its subversion of Hollywood's two
primary currencies: the special effects epic, and, in the casting of
Kirsten Dunst as von Trier's alter ego, the celebrity confessional.

2/10

MEEK'S CUTOFF,Kelly Reichardt (U.S.)

Has a better American film been made about survival instincts in the
face of economic desperation, since the start of the downturn, than
Kelly Reichardt's gorgeously unsettling Oregon Trail tale? In a great
year for supporting actors, Bruce Greenwood's incredible transformation
into the rugged titular character is the most unjustly overlooked.

3/10

THE TREE OF LIFE,Terrence Malick (U.S.)

Even if the reach of Terrence Malick's infinite loop exceeds its
grasp, that reach is unprecedented. At Cannes, it was tempting to pick a
side between Tree of Life and Melancholia -- Team
Terry's earnest theological questioning versus Team Lars' Dogme dystopia
-- but even in their wildly diverging stylistic and philosophical
approaches to life, death and the mysteries of the universe, the two
films defined the year in film with their implicit dialogue with one
another.

4/10

THE ARBOR,Clio Barnard (U.K.)

Not just the best nonfiction film of 2011, Clio Barnard's hybrid of
primary-source reporting and dramatic staging to tell the tale of
alcoholic British council estate bard Andrea Dunbar and the daughters
she left behind is also the most innovative -- not a small feat in a year
that brought the archival superedit The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu.

5/10

A SEPARATION,Asghar Farhadi (Iran)

A master class in storytelling and character study under any
circumstances, Asghar Farhadi's Berlinale winner, about the
reverberations of one middle-class housewife's decision to leave her
family when her husband refuses to leave Iran, is all the more
impressive as an implicit -- but, in an incredible feat of footwork,
never direct -- critique of the standards and practices of the Iranian
government that sanctioned its production.

6/10

DRIVE,Nicolas Winding Refn (Denmark)

The best music video Michael Mann never made. Ryan Gosling's
(unsuccessful) campaign ad for the crown of Sexiest Man Alive. A
movie-length, escalating joke about the manipulative seduction of genre
film tropes, Drive is the visual pleasure bomb that critiques itself.

7/10

CONTAGION,Steven Soderbergh (U.S.)

A filmmaker whose primary obsessions have been work and sex, Steven
Soderbergh turned an outbreak story that demonizes both into an
unflinching, dispassionate nail-biter. Uniquely Soderberghian in its
appropriation of a Hollywood genre for personal ends, when the big,
emotional catharsis comes, it's all the more devastating as a break from
the total coldness that preceded it.

8/10

THE FUTURE,Miranda July (U.S.)

The best of 2011's many Sundance hitsturnedbox office bombs. The
reception accorded Miranda July's second feature -- a deeply personal and
fully unique hybrid of hipster relationship drama, lo-fi sci-fi and
filmed performance art -- only affirms its courage as a would-be
commercial endeavor.

9/10

MONEYBALL,Bennett Miller (U.S.)

Am I biased as a baseball fan? Maybe, although as a faithful follower
of the Dodgers -- whose 2011 season offered a gripping seesaw of tragedy
and triumph -- I hardly needed to go looking for baseball drama
elsewhere. Less an adaptation of Michael Lewis' best-seller than a
cinematic rendering of the unlikely marriage between passion and fiscal
necessity that motivated the sport to put its faith in sabermetrics, Moneyball moved me to tears. Twice. My vote for the most satisfying popcorn movie of the year.